


Forbidden Colours

by BlueWay (orphan_account)



Category: Not Another D&D Podcast (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, Friendship/Love, Grinding, Hand Jobs, Heavy Petting, Love Confessions, Self-Doubt, Semi-Public Sex, Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-14
Updated: 2020-04-14
Packaged: 2021-03-01 23:33:39
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 19,724
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23645452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/BlueWay
Summary: Takes places during Episode 58 - Moonshine's thoughts and dreams linger on the truth of herself, Hardwon can only do his best to remind her that what she is is not who she is.
Relationships: Moonshine Cybin/Hardwon Surefoot
Comments: 6
Kudos: 63





	Forbidden Colours

**Author's Note:**

> Admittedly this one is a weird post, at least for me, which is why I'm only uploading it to AO3. I usually don't do these type of things, or, at least, the more smutty parts for public consumption, however I'm a pragmatic person and I know this particular fandom lacks this kind of explicit stuff, so I'm sure some of you will get a kick out of this. Not that it needs it but it's part of me more or less fulfilling the literary part of Rule34. Or so I tell myself.
> 
> It's also weird in the fact that although these are fictional characters, they are proxies, more directly, for real people given the nature of DnD. Admittedly I felt awkward writing this out given the NaDDpod's irl interpersonal relationships, so uh, my apologies to everyone on the NaDDpod crew in the god awful case they somehow come across this. You guys are wonderful and actually give me so much joy listening in to your story telling and fun. It inspired me to DM actually for the first time. I wish I did tune into CH more growing up, but hey, I'm glad you're in my life now.
> 
> All of this being a very weird heart to heart into what is essentially the equivalent of a gas station romance novel scene.
> 
> Characterization is, hopefully, in line, but where this takes place is of course kinda weird given what I know now as someone who's listened up to 96 at the time of this posting, so I'm kinda battling three versions of these characters trying to put it into word: the people they were at this moment, who they are now, and of course my interpretation and application of them. I don't think Moonshine would've actually needed all of this, and perhaps Hardwon wouldn't be as eloquent as displayed, but hey it's fanfiction and I will never be able to get it as perfect as I want it. I think it's the worst thing I've ever posted just about 
> 
> I'm also personally a shipper of these two, and they are set up to be life partners really after their adventures, however my guess is that it won't have as much romantic lovey-dovey undertones as I display here, and that's okay because that deep bond kinda elevates above those notions of romance and partnership. It is that of family and kinship.
> 
> Also a big scene in this story, in fact what inspired it outright, is based on this music video for Fisher King with Ryuichi Skaamoto's titular music (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q6ShHGXaS_E). Just that idea of a waltz, of two broken people wading through dancers, it just stuck with me with the music playing.
> 
> Anyway, before I start rambling more uncomfortably: Read and, in the most chaste way I can say, enjoy!
> 
> (Also if you like what you read with this sorta stuff I do/have done commission, because at that point it's just business)

The particulars of Elven physiology were, when compared to the less magical, less arcane species of the worlds and planes, often seen as a positive: Long life, a certain sense of grace and beauty that was unmatched by the other races. Innate magica ability, being in touch with certain aspects of the divine, it was a pretty radical deal by Moonshine Cybin's account as an elf.

Trancing was one of those advantages that she had been long aware of, but she was never one for outright tradition. So, she had slept for once, as the rest of her party did. The Band of Boobs, self-named, had been the sort to grow into each other. Aspects of each other, their own learned experiences and trials taken by the whole, had been imparted, absorbed. Together they were made whole.

Moonshine however had woken from the unfamiliar sleep with a feeling of horror: Of emptiness.

It was good for her that, after all was said and done, King Lesterborne and Queen Cyrilla returned truly, Night itself returned to the lands of the Autumn Court, their successes had been met with celebration, with drugs and alcohol, and, eventually, more cause for joy:

It was Young Beverly Toegold's 16th as well.

Who was she as a Crick Elf to not literally blow up in hospitality for, as far as anyone was concerned, her family? Especially for the poor Bev, with questions of family especially in his mind now.

The show she had put up on the sky, of fire and joy, works of magic explosions which the Autumn Court had not seen in centuries, she hadn't much cared for the onlooked save for Young Bev. It was his day, and he deserved as much of her as she could muster. Paw Paw had been more than ecstatic to dance in the new moonlight amongst the stars and fireworks as Balnor watched the party over with his fatherly aim, still laying back himself on the hill they found themselves in the Autumn Court.

It was Hardwon Surefoot, who had been as heavily into it as she had, who had truly let the Autumn Court know how a Human with his Dwarven soul and Dwarven Daddies let loose.

It was in the bursts of light above from her fireworks that revealed a man down to his skinnies and dirty, living up a night where everything, momentarily, was fine. Shadowfell was a problem for the Hardwon of tomorrow, not tonight. It was perhaps his carefree aura, his want of a night where he smelled nothing but earthen familiarity and Crick Water that allowed Moonshine to be as they knew her:

A Crick Elf. The next leader of her people as she had been brought up as; The Crick's prodigal daughter, and all that it meant. From the way she looked to the heart she had. It was all defined by the fact she was a Crick Elf.

 **She wasn't**. Not as she thought. That she was told. That she had been forced to know as true.

_Your daddy's a High Elf._

Everything that she was had been not as she knew.

" _You're not welcome here, I'm sorry. You're no daughter of mine." Jolene turns her away as her people show nothing but their backs, ejected from her home. The only place she had ever dreamed of coming back to._

Moonshine was frozen in her nightmares, a foreign concept to her as someone who had once tranced. A mind untrained, unrealizing, had been even crueler, sending her from friend to friend, place to place, only to be rejected, to be casts asides and told that she was not welcome. All the hospitality she had given the world denied back to her in a moment of need:

It is at the end of her nightmare that night, rolling on the blanket on that side of a hill, that creates a hole in her heart that transcends the visions of sleep:

_There they are, the Band of Boobs, on a path of their journey, same as always, onward to save the world. They come to a crossroads however, a fork. They are as they are: Balnor, holding their bag over his shoulder with strong arms, built from a life lived and a family he had once held with them. Young Bev, more good and more heart than this world deserved of him, his pack held by him by its straps as his curled hair bounces in the soft wind. And then there's Hardwon. The best man any of them had ever known. All strength and righteous courage, built from bravado and an admittedly good heart, broken around itself._

_She, Moonshine Cybin, arbiter of everything nice and kind in that world, had found her home with them, walking in stride, finding their destiny together._

_In that dream though, there were horrors._

_"So, which way y'all?" Moonshine asks, expecting of the bickering, of plans, of rationale and dice rolls it felt like._

_No one answers her, but they had their own paths._

_She feels cold. The same cold that witch put her under. The cold that had pressed upon her heart with such steel it threatened to crack her down the center._

_"Why would we care? We don't know who you are. You're not one of ours." Young Bev asks with as much serendipity as his voice usually allowed, but the words had been so alien, so foreign to think of, Moonshine couldn't believe it as she tried to move her arm. It wouldn't though, not toward them, her family, her party._

_One by one they leave._

_She sees Bev with innocence he has since lost, look at her with that beaming smile that she had seen reflected in so many Crick youths. He has so much of a future ahead of him that it kills her, in a way, that she won't be there for it, she thinks._

_She sees Balnor, dragging along the bag, and with no recognition in his eye he gives her a rather fatherly nod and turns away behind Bev. He has lost so much, but feels nothing losing her._

_Hardwon, she wants to reach out, scream out, but nothing comes out of her as he spins his axe around his hand and just looks at her. He was always happy to see her, and vice versa. Dependable as the stone he grew up with. Surely, he wouldn't leave her._

_He does._

_Last to leave her is her first, and she is brought to her knees as she feels like she is melting into the earth: eye to eye with Paw Paw. Her skittering child, her scramble man._

"Please, Paw Paw- _Please." She begs her child with words she cannot utter, but he does nothing but scratch at her in hisses, pedaling back into a group, no longer her own._

_"Ur ur ur ur, you're not Moonshine!" He says, cursing her._

The particulates from her fireworks still remained when she snapped awake, floating into the Feywild like pixies. In their One Big Bed sleeping arrangement, transferred to a blanket, it had been, from left to right: Hardwon, then herself, Bev and Balnor, with Paw Paw sprawled out somewhere on them. It was one of Hardwon's arms that had provided the impromptu pillow for Moonshine and Bev that night, he sprawled out as nature intended save for the loin cloth he had stolen (?) at some point before they had made it out to the hill.

Dreams, nightmares. The visions in her trances never compared.

She had run her fingers through her child's fur before the warmth and rousing awoke him, her hand pulling back as if on fire; the nightmare had still been too fresh, and those that left her behind had been too close, even if they hadn't been the same people.

The night was still young, all things accounted for. A people new to night had no particular notion of time as she had more understood it in the mortal plane. The hustle and bustle of crowds of celebrating and joyous Eladrin off in the distance of the Autumn Court's city.

She felt alone, and yet it was a feeling of twilight for her: To be alone outright, it was terrible, and yet, she needed it at that moment.

As quietly as she could she had stood above her sleeping party, seeing the peace on their faces that had eluded herself. The brisk wind had stuck some of her red bangs to her face, drawing them back behind her ears with her fingers, shedding the weak fungal bulbs all the while.

She was headstrong, for better or worse, and in the wake of a nightmare she had figured this:

Might as well get used to it; the leaving.

* * *

The first time they all slept together it had been a fluke that it had been the three of them sleeping. Beverly Toegold's own escapades with the Green Teens on camping expeditions had drawn upon many nights where he had been curled up with Erlin (and the other teens of course) in a tight tent.

At the Dwarphanage the cold stone necessitated a particular amount of communal snuggling, and so Hardwon Surefoot had, just by the amount of Hardwon Surefoot there was to go around, been a personal heater to many.

The nature of the Crick, of its people and the particular essences of hospitality, it very much meant snuggling and cuddling was a common way. Nothing to say of Moonshine's own large family.

As for when Balnor joined, the man had a family, children; this had been his normal for far longer than it had been the Boobs.

However, it was their normal still, and the absence of a particular pressure against his arm had been felt as Hardwon Surefoot awoke. Like a sixth sense, born from the battles of the last barely month and a half he had known all of them, he was distinctly sobered from what was a drunken sleep.

_Moonshine's gone!_

He would've yelled it, springing up and looking for Kingshammer, but he had stopped short as Young Bev rolled off his hand into Balnor's side. The tell-tale sign that everything had been… okay, he felt, was that Paw Paw's fur had been freshly raked. Fresh in regard to Moonshine that is, which is to say fresh mushrooms.

For a moment, he had considered dialing Rapport Spores, but he had known how finicky it was when it came to those on the network that had also been asleep, and the man had no intention of waking the two others up. It'd been a long day. Not to say they hadn't been used to them by now, but it hadn't gotten any easier. He thought himself lucky in a way. He knew he was strong, and young, capable of the fight that their journey asked of them. Why did the world make a young boy, a sixteen-year-old child, fight for its justice? Why did this life call upon a broken man who had lost too much already?

What did this journey take from them already?

His fears subsided as he felt a familiar tinge in the air. Being on Moonshine's fungal network had been a curious thing, as close to a sixth sense he ever had, and, tonight, one he followed as he made his way down the hill, leaving all but the loin cloth he wore.

When he arrived in Moonstone in what felt like a lifetime ago, he wondered if he could very much spend the rest of his days as a fisherman. Clearly, he was a born and bred adventurer, however he sometimes wished that the simplicity of fishing fish had been translated over to what he was doing now. If he could've spent the rest of his life just simply traveling, taking in culture and helping this world with his family, the one that he chose, he would've. That was, at times, what he looked for in hardship. It was the lie that this world was fair that he told himself.

He could look up into the stars of the Feywild and think nothing of the war back home.

They looked like the gemstones and veins of Irondeep; of mines unlit and the familiarity of the underground.

Leaving home for the first time it had overwhelmed him how big the world actually was, how fresh air tasted, how it burned his coal filled nose and how it made him feel alive in a way he should've known as a Human. It was his first night, alone, with nothing but the clothes on his back and a rucksack of provisions, that he had huddled on the softest ground he had ever felt in a forest and had many firsts:

The first time he saw stars, the emotion and bewilderment and pure awe that there had been something so much bigger than him, Hardwon Surefoot, it was a moment that humbled.

He knew the feeling well, and many of the Eladrin did so now too.

They weren't the only ones who had taken to the hills around the Autumn Court, seeing families, young children, couples in love in starlight, look up at the night for the first time in their lives and see the closest many of them would ever come to heaven. He passed them by, unnoticed, all of them rightfully captivated by the color of night.

It was beautiful, and it called for a celebration that too reminded him of home.

Approaching the city of the Autumn Court, street lights, unused in centuries, had to have been erected: crude affairs of either flame or glow stones. In Iron Deep, the same crude implements would light the main caves as the celebrations of a new section of Iron Deep was completed or a new monument was made. Alone, he would've felt at home, maybe, but enough was different:

For one the Eladrin had been his height, something he was still struggling with.

Out in the street celebrating, what passed for street carts and makeshift firework magic stalls open for business, all in imitation of Moonshine's own.

It was hard for him to be inconspicuous, naked as he was: A Human in a land of fey.

Still his feet brought him forward, following a faint scent, a faint hint, of Moonshine Cybin. No hangover yet, the fringes of his own celebration remained. The dry taste of alcohol on the roof of his mouth, it stained, but reminded him of just how happy everyone had been hours prior.

Everyone but him had been still that kind of happy, flowing through the streets of the Autumn Court.

A male Eladrin hadn't moved away as he came chest to chest with him.

"Oh my! You're one of the heroes who brought back the crown!" It was no high as being recognized as Hardwon Surefoot, Bastard of the Mountain, Pride of the Dwarfanage, Greataxe of Irondeep, but "Crown Recoverer" was good as anything. It wasn't his fault he had flexed all of his muscles as the recognizer approached him in the crowd.

"Yep, that's me alright. What's up?" He had looked over the Eladrin, trying to find the tell-tale trace of Moonshine, but found nothing as he settled on the sight of the man.

He was a silver haired gentleman, dressed politely, but casual enough for the festivities happening around them. A tall face typical of the elves but with a certain air about them that Hardwon had trusted to at least casually talk to with at the moment.

"Oh no, I just wanted to thank you for everything! You've done a good thing for our people!"

A crowd of people passed around them, and for a moment he had been the center of the Autumn Court, people pointing him out. Any other time he would've soaked it in, but there was an air of urgency to him now.

Hardwon didn't know his face had been contorted into some numb look of worry, however he had righted that into graciousness immediately, extending out one his large palms. The Eladrin had taken it readily, a shake given.

"Anyone would've done the same." He said, and he meant it. What if there had been ulterior motives? At least a good deed was done.

"Are you used to being in… such a state of dress?" The Eladrin asked.

Hardwon had looked down at his body, his shame barely kept.

He knew why he didn't feel too weird like this. "I was raised by miners. We worked like this, sometimes, as our ancestors did." He was still a dwarf in a way, pausing as he said it. The original kings approved of him, still told him his heart was worthy of them, that had settled it. "When it was too hot or flammable. Not for fun… usually"

The silver haired Eladrin had looked him up and down before patting his arm once. "Well, this isn't a mine, dear sir… where are you going dressed as this? Our bath houses perhaps?"

Hardwon shook his head. "Not quite. I'm looking for my friend. Red hair? Freckles? She's got a gap between her two front teeth and kinda has all sorts of plant bits falling out of her at all times."

How easy it was to picture Moonshine in his mind… He only hoped that what he had said was enough for the Eladrin. It was, recognition coming over him. "Oh yes, I did see her pass by. Didn't seem all that happy compared to the rest of us here."

Hardwon's bushy eyebrows were tilted down instantly at the thought. "Do you know where she's going?"

The Eladrin shook his head sadly. "I'm sorry, I don't believe so, that being said there's only one real attraction down the road I saw her going down."

"What would that be?"

The Eladrin gestured with his thumb. "The Hall of Steps and Song. It's a banquet hall of sorts."

A banquet hall? "Well, that's where I'm going then."

The Eladrin recoiled immediately, causing Hardwon even to pause, looking him up and down again. "Not like that."

It took Hardwon a moment to fully understand what he meant, but a particularly cold burst of air had hit his chest at that moment. "What're they gonna do, toss me out?"

The Eladrin nodded. "Exactly that, actually. Most places would given your state of dress."

Hardwon scrunched his face, eyes glancing around. A solution was always around the corner as far as he had known. Maybe a clothing store or some drunk fools he could pull outfits off of. He was pretty sure that's how he had come into having this loin cloth he was wearing. His underwear had been a much more respectable design than just this barbaric assortment…

Where did the clothes he started the night out in end up?

Karma would be repaid today fortunately. "I can let you have some of my clothing, it'd be the least I can do to repay you for what you've done for us." He gestured up into the night sky again, and then to a genuine enjoyment of the Autumn Court around them. It was not often they were allowed to be young, for things to be new. Generosity was the only thing that could be given that night. Momentarily, Hardwon had thought, maybe hospitality was something embedded in all elves.

"Got something my size?" He had made a point to roll his shoulders a bit, making note of exactly his form. It was big, to say the least. "My bod isn't really elven, you dig?"

The Eladrin seemed unbothered. "Nonsense. I collect odds and ends from my merchant friends. One such thing was a set of our clothes form fitted for an owl bear. I believe you should fit."

* * *

"Holy shit I fit."

Sleeves were a bit short, but nothing rolled cuffs couldn't fix.

It turns out returning the day/night cycle to a place bought a lot of goodwill, enough for this Eladrin he had hardly known for five minutes to invite him inside of his home and give him clothes, letting him change in his own bedroom.

There he stood in front of a mirror, checking himself out in an attire far more elegant than he had ever worn. The elves had their way around, even in an attempt to dress a half-bear, half-owl. Warm blacks with swirls of gold around its edges, making him seem outlined even the dark. The shoulders curved into wings almost, giving his broad form an even more imposing look, but there was an air of grace to it that was counterbalanced by his dirty brown beard just tumbling over its front, what buttons there had been undone for his preference.

"Yeah, it was a shame the owl bear mauled its owner before this could be delivered, so I hear."

Morbid, but fortunate. For him at least. "Yikes. Also, uh, thanks… What's your name again bud?"

"Viralis. And don't worry about getting this back to me. It was just taking up space in my closet."

"Well, I don't got one, so uh, yeah. I'll be back."

If clothes had been a particular issue, the bar had been low enough, or Moonshine had been betrodden-looking enough, to have come in with her overalls and not much else. The lack of weight in her bib had been disconcerting at first, but she hardened her heart and went forward into the night, following advice and directions until she found a rather large dome building on the outskirts of the Autumn Court.

The doors opened automagically, an artificial blast of air drying her eyes as she was offered a lobby to walk into.

She was the most traveled of the Boobs before Moonstone. Maybe she hadn't had adventures as grand as the ones she had taken on now, but she had made her way in the world once. In one of the first towns she visited after she left the Crick there had been an amazing little theatre dedicated to the imitation of the stars. A revolving, giant gem, bought from Irondeep had served as a giant amplifying lens for a beam of light, creating a lightshow that rivaled MeeMaw's fireworks.

She fell asleep that day in the reclining seats, beneath the light of gems.

She wondered, distantly, if Hardwon had mined that gem, if he was responsible for that show in the end.

This lobby reminded her of that theatre, prim and proper, a fabric floor beneath her soles. A single doorman had awaited inside, another set of wooden doors closed behind him. He had recognized her. "Welcome to the Hall of Steps and Song!" He had said, automatically, probably as he had for all who came here. There was more to that script probably but he stopped when he recognized her. "Oh my. You delivered the crown." He said, dropping his arms from their rigid place, folded over his stomach.

Word got around unfortunately.

Moonshine had placated him with a nod and a smile. "Yeah, hi. I was told I could come here for the bar? The rest of the taverns are busy tonight and I kinda… just need to be alone."

"Ah, of course. If you're here for just the bar, feel free. Be aware that our facility is being used for something else at the moment… Fortunately they're in between sessions."

She might've heard what, exactly, the facility was being used for, but she had tuned all of that as the doorman led her into the grand hall past those doors.

What the world had considered a party, a gathering, outside of the Crick, Moonshine had almost laughed and despaired at the fact. There was no party like a Crick party.

She wasn't there for a party however, she was here for a quiet drink, to be alone.

It was a giant dance hall, golden and rustic, almost, in color, warm lighting emanating from fixtures in the wall all spreading out toward the back to a raised stage. Eladrin, dressed in formal wear, jewels and Autumn colors made into dresses and suits, had consorted amongst themselves, all standing within the confines of the wooden dance floor as those who awaited a something stood off to the sides.

On that raised stage in the back, wooden chairs, cascading out to stands as if in tiers. Great instruments had been awaited players, yet to funnel in.

There was easily eighty people in that hall tonight, however it had been quiet, much to Moonshine's benefit as she had been led to the bar by the doorman, he, out of her vision, signaling for a person.

A female Eladrin in a silver, twinkling dress had appeared before them, moving herself behind the bar. "I'm very sorry, I didn't expect-"

"Oh, no worries." Moonshine had tried her best at platitude, but it came out colder than she intended, even tonight. Motioning through her pocket she had found some pieces of gold, hoping that the currency was the same. The doorman had interceded before the metal hit the wooden bar top. She was the only one there, sitting.

"We know who you are. You did a lot for us, all this, even," The doorman extended his hand out to the dancers, eagerly awaiting a number to start. "All of this is on us."

The bartender agreed, primly folding her hands behind herself and awaiting for Moonshine's beck and call.

This kindness, was it really hers to give. "I- I…" She paused. "I insist, lemme just," She did finally put gold on the counter. "It's only right."

"Okay." The bartender had said kindly, palming the gold pieces away as the doorman settled, sharing a nod with the bartender and returning to his position away. "What can I get you?"

Moonshine's tired eyes traced the bottles behind the counter in their glass shelves and containers, lit by a white light. Even back on the material plane branding and particular strains of alcohol had been lost to her. Still, even then, it was a daunting selection.

"Quite a bit for this kinda place, don't you think?"

The bartender smiled, smoothing her bangs as she answered. "This is a dance hall, primarily. The drinks are for the after; however, we will never say no to a hero."

She remembered the parties at the Crick. Dancing was anything that bent the spine and threw the hips. "Dance? That a thing you do?"

"Not particularly." The bartender had started. "Dancing in the Autumn Court is something very sacred to us as a people. The fine lines, the steps, all of it done in tandem with a partner is the purest form of physical unity… I believe our King and Queen being reunited sets the tone."

Fair enough, Moonshine considered. "Getting back into practice then?"

"In a manner of speaking." The bartender opened up the glass shutters, the bottles of alcohol in colors and shapes that were beyond her as a mortal elf.

She just needed to ride this out a little longer, to let it deal out in her mind so she could move on. "Whatever's… strong. I ain't from 'round here so, I leave it with you."

The muted steps behind her had closed in before she could face them.

"I'll have two of what she's having then." Her eyes went wide as she turned over, only to feel the familiar hand of Hardwon Surefoot settle her down on her shoulder. Instinctively her own hand raised up to feel, however she stopped short, the two of them settling into seats at the bar. "You good, Moonshine?"

The relationship between the two of them had been unique among the Boobs. At first it had been just them and Young Bev, and, despite how mature the teenager had been, the full breadth of adult complexity had been missing. It was by no means a dig against Bev, but it was missing from him in the way that Hardwon and Moonshine had experience with as fully-grown adults. The trials and tribulations that came with maturity, with having lived a life so far, it drew the two older members together:

Moments, just before dawn, where Moonshine had been well awake already due to her trancing, where Hardwon would be her only accompany as Paw Paw grabbed a few extra Zs.

Coy jokes, said beneath breaths that were never intended for the innocent ears of Bev or the fatherly persona of Balnor.

The physical presence: of fingertips touching arms, foreheads in contact, the almost instinctual urge that they had for each other's company.

Observations, the knowledge of little tics that they knew of each other by heart (Hardwon spins his axe during battle when choices are concerned. Hard moral choices. To let them live, or to let them die? Moonshine, she flares her nostrils before any of her strikes, and when she does it out of battle Hardwon knows that she's fighting something still, within her mind. It's one of the tells he sees here).

They were close. Closer than perhaps they liked thinking.

It was natural, like that. More understanding of each other than Bev could outright, but there had been a depth to it that was only revealed when Balnor joined. A halfling who had done more than just lived a life: he had lost it. This contrast, the presence of an older man who had been more than willing to impart a lifetime's experience upon them both, it had drawn Moonshine and Hardwon together.

He looked good in the Elvish attire, as much as she was loathed to admit it. If only he'd been born as a Crick Elf, things might've been different between them… Would it have been different? A thought that flashed her mind as the bar tender slid the polite looking glasses their way, swimming with their drink. He'd always been something of a looker by her standards. Her real standards that is: the very selfish biases she always hid. All people were beautiful of course, but even she had her opinions, her beliefs.

The idea of calling Hardwon beautiful to his face though might've been an insult to him.

He went to double fist the two glasses but Moonshine shook her head, holding one of his hands down, stopping him. "If you're gonna be here then, just- here." She didn't answer him outright.

There was always a vial of Crick Water for her in her overalls. What surprised Hardwon was what she did with it this time, slipping some of the runny liquid into their glasses before taking her bare finger and spinning them to mix, little fungal bulbs from beneath her nail perhaps falling in.

She looked up to see the bartender fairly concerned. "Oh, uh-! It's not what you think, promise."

Hardwon had chuckled in her defense. "Consider it our special garnish."

"Yeah, yeah." She held her glass, unsure of it, but then remembering the entire reason she was here was that of all things she was unsure of, it had been herself first. No formality, no clink of a glass, just she sent back a healthy gulp of it and felt the fire, and then the numbing almost immediately. The taste had burned and then it was familiar as she felt something brewing in her gut that she breathed out.

"Special occasion, Moonie?"

When had he started calling her that? She didn't remember, but damned herself for not coming up with it herself. It was good. She liked it when said by him.

In better spirits she might've found a nickname for him in kind.

"Mm." That hadn't been like her, Hardwon immediately pegged, considering both her and the drink, newly concocted. He remembered his first few, ill-advised times he had sipped upon Crick water: how it burned and tasted of mud and bile. Watered down with- he took a sip finally- some sort of rum it was palpable and immediate. First had been the cup in his right hand, and then the one in his left of course. He blessed the bulk that he had in allowing him to not instantly pass out from drink, though the feeling of this, it was a different high than he had known. It was rough for him, and he had to wonder what it had done to the Crick Elf.

She had cringed a moment as she took it down, a raspy breath out as it run down her throat.

A bubble of _something_ settled within her before popping, a wave of heat and then tingle going through her form that made her twitch on her stool.

The two had to deal, silently, with the concoction of rum and crick water to bleed its way into their bodies, disseminating, letting it run its course after a night already celebrating.

"Can, can I ask you something Hardwon?"

"Hah- urhk." He had burped up the fumes of the crick water and made the mistake of inhaling it again. Truly a devastating cycle. "Yeah, sure, of course."

She considered for a moment, half fighting the crick water down and half really thinking if she wanted to put Hardwon through this with her. A flash of a thought as she looked at his handsome face: Was this the same man that would disown her for being who she really was?

She made the mistake of shaking her head as if churning a drink inside of her skull; the answer was no, but she had only stirred the drink further in herself.

"How do you deal, with, like… you?"

"Ouch." Hardwon had put a laugh behind that. "I don't mean to be, uh- like that I guess. However you're thinking."

"No no no no," Moonshine had raised her hands defensively. "You're the best, promise. What I mean is…" she blew an offending strand of hair out of her face, hoping the barkeeps didn't notice the pollen that erupted from the maneuver. "You've been a lot in your life, you know?"

Hardwon Surefoot. Bastard. Orphan. A man, and a dwarf at the same time. Heir to nothing, and then the world from the bow of a ship. His heart belonged to Gemma, to the skies, to Irondeep, to the Stormborns, to Young Bev and Balnor, to the Crick, and to Moonshine Cybin. Though what was his heart? Did he know? How did he deal with that question? Did he know who he was really?

Maybe it was the rapport spores, maybe it was just how close the two had become in the comparatively short time they had known each other, but Hardwon knew what she was asking.

"I mean, at the end of the day, I know I'm Hardwon Surefoot. It really doesn't matter beyond that, really." He took a moment, seeing the drinks in his hands and taking another sip. This one had been less grating, less jarring; pleasant even. "All that I am, it's all that I show, you know? I deal with what I know I can. No witch will ever tell me who's who and what's what."

Not one to fall behind, Moonshine had taken another sip of her drink, settling into the rhythm.

"But that doesn't mean you aren't something, beneath that. That there's something beneath all that you have to confront one day."

Deep down inside, he both knew it, and felt it. Deep down, the beneath, he had been the son of his father, headstrong and willing to fight to the very last for the sake of glory. It was a deadly affair that he knew wasn't right, but he had fulfilled that blood rite anyway. Deep down inside, he had it within himself to abandon his future for the sake of a now.

He curled his lips for a moment, looking into the cloudy drink and seeing himself reflected. "Perhaps. But that really doesn't matter much. Not if I'm Hardwon first to people."

"Hm." She had grunted. "Ain't a bad thing to be."

Fast acting: that's how Crick Water was. Starting from the inside out the effects were almost immediate. The world had been a little more colorful, the bottles behind the bar had shone a little brighter. It might've been easy to forget why he was here with the world gone pastel, but Hardwon kept himself on track as best he could, turning his head over, looking at Moonshine's profile and the squint in her eye; her grasp of the glass in her hand and how she was so close to cracking it.

There was no more avoiding it. "Are you okay, Moonshine? You kinda went off without telling anyone."

She looked up at that tall ceiling, seeing golden light bounce off of its curves. No stars. "I just kinda wanted to have a conversation with myself. Just myself."

Hardwon licked his teeth, feeling the sheen of alcohol on it as he looked at Moonshine lean back. "But why?"

"Questions, things like that." She answered almost silently. "Stuff I have to deal with."

"Alone?"

She turned over, catching his eyes. _Was that a guess?_ "Yeah… You- you shouldn't have followed me out here Hardwon."

Hardwon rolled his tongue against his cheek. "Perhaps. But it's not like you."

She took another sip, darkly parroting. " _Like you."_ She wasn't quite sure if the words came out of her mouth, rambling to herself as she didn't fight any of the effects of her concoction, feeling the snap in her mind and at the back of her teeth. "What is, "like me"?"

Hardwon considered. Moonshine Cybin had been Moonshine Cybin. Nothing more, nothing less, in his mind. She was a symbol of goodness, of perhaps not the best ideals, but of the reality given to them: pragmatic kindness applied to a world that was not deserving of it perhaps. She did her best for life itself through her fungal lens.

The thought then, from the witch:

"Still thinking about the fight?"

Of truth through blood.

"Mm." She affirmed, muting with another spicy sip.

Something like rum in her glass with all the bite of whiskey, mixed together with the dry fumes of Crick Water.

A few moments passed, uncomfortable. How, alone, Hardwon had weathered the storms of their sins. Survivor's guilt, perhaps. Though he meant it true: he was broken, fundamentally, to his core once. That didn't mean he hadn't been built up however. That didn't mean he hadn't been a man now. What he did in that fight then-

"Sorry I kissed you, by the way, if it was sudden or you didn't want it or-" He had brought to light, sputtered, looking away.

"Hardwon." She stopped him by the utterance of his name. "It was very Crick of you to do so. Don't you worry about that."

He turned back over, seeing her face, only to see her look away.

"Ah, okay. I was just making sure."

"Kissed you back, d'int I?" She said, almost timidly, in a tone Hardwon hadn't heard before.

Another sip, from both of them. "That you did. You didn't have to though."

"Shucks." Another sip as she said it. "I had all the reason in the world to kiss ya back."

"Yeah? Like what?"

There was an answer there; admittance. She wasn't quite sure if she could bring herself to say it as she swirled her drink in her hands, knowing she was falling into comfortable banter. She didn't _want_ to be comfortable.

"Not like I was worth saving anyhow."

It was a deflection, surely.

"That's not true. Never was."

"You know who you are, Hardwon. I don't."

He furrowed his eyebrows at her. "So what if you're a High Elf? You can be more than one thing at a time."

She felt a dirty (or clean) chill run through her spine, goosebumps at the thought. She was a High Elf, she had secrets within her, hidden from herself. How could she not know?

"Why did no one ever tell me?" She wondered aloud.

_No one told her because it was wrong. That it was shameful to know._

Right? That was what made sense to her at that moment, running her palm down her face, cupping her mouth.

Was it the truth that, as Jolene had held her once and called her the pride of the Crick, she knew what lay beneath her?

How many lies was she built on?

Hardwon had no answer but to take another sip, letting a silence fill in, trying to find something to say.

He looked across the counter, to the shiny glass cabinets of drinks and saw his distorted reflection on it. Like this, in its distorted form, he looked like a dwarf.

"Maybe… maybe it's better you never knew until now?"

"Huh?"

Hardwon blinked, keeping his eyes closed as he chose his next words carefully. This really didn't feel like the best thing he could say but he had to say something.

"I… really didn't know I was a Human at first. The other Dwarphans, they just thought I was bigger than them, initially, and that wasn't an issue, until I kept growing, and I kept growing." Hardwon was distant, remembering a past he wish he didn't have. "I kept telling myself as I grew that I was a Dwarf, but then the rumors started. I ignored them at first, how the others teased me, but it was when the adults came down and told me that I was it kinda just…"

"Would you have been better if you just thought you were a tall dwarf?" Moonshine had reached out and touched, gingerly, his forearm. It was a natural thing for her, feeling her empathy, ignoring what she had been thinking about.

"I don't know… It sounds like, denial, if you put it like that… Point being, it wasn't kind. It wasn't good to know that I was different like that to my bone, nagging at the back of my head. Maybe I would've been better if I knew I was a dwarf, outright, instead of that truth."

"Do you want to be a dwarf? Full and full?" She asked, quietly.

"Somedays more than some… and back then, yeah. It doesn't matter though. I became one." By his own merits, by his own volition. He had his pride. "How about you? Do you want to be a Crick Elf? Despite everything?"

Hardwon had turned the question on her in a way.

"Of course I do, Hardwon."

"What's stopping you?"

_What I am._

She dipped her finger in her seemingly endless glass, seeing the spores beneath her finger nails take off and coalesce further in it. "I think there are truths to people, built into their bones." She rumbled, trying to find answers in her naturally produced fungality. "We act on it, and we come from it… So what in the Hells do I come from then?"

"Don't you believe that people can be more than what they are though?"

"Yes, yes, it's just that, I thought I knew what I was."

This wasn't the fun type of drinking. It was the type of drinking akin to pouring water over a whet stone, all in preparation for the hard grind, the sharpening of an edge. The type of drinking that reminded them of exhaustion, of need.

"Think Arcaine would be any good with this?"

"Don't you dare." That scolding, that worry, it sounded more like her than the rest of their conversation. "Besides, ain't this strong enough?"

"Long as we're standing, probably not."

An amused breath through her nose. Keeping it light, he was, but before that she had to just say: "Had a dream, bad one, earlier. We was going on our journey all right and proper, doing okay, and, and, well, just at the end of it you left me behind because I wasn't who I was."

Hardwon had taken it in, disappointment in a version himself read through the lines of his face.

"We'd never do that. Not to you. Never."

"I know, I know, I know," she pushed out. "But people do that. Stuff like this is why we as a people were kicked out in the first place, you know? And what if it happens with me again?"

History was cyclical, history repeated, Hells, their history had already played out. This version of them was only but one path of time they knew from Alanis.

"Moonshine," Hardwon started. "The people you travel with would never do that, and the Crick loves you. I-"

"I know they do, but this is big. This goes to my very blood and maybe I'll wake up tomorrow morning and think "Huh, I was really overreacting about this stuff" but right now- right now I feel like there's something there and it's sticking so hard that if I let it stay it's gonna follow me."

Hardwon took another idle sip, feeling his breath becoming that essence of Crick Water with the taste of rum and whiskey. It was addictive, the Crick Water; drinking this concoction had felt as natural as breathing now, his mind blanking out moments when he was taking it back.

"What's MeeMaw gonna think? Ole Cobb? My family? Hells! Just who in the hell did MeeMaw even get up with in the end?! I mean I know the man must be dirty, but- but…" Her glass slammed on the counter, giving the bartender a slight concern as little splatter came out and she wrapped her face in her hands. "What is this going to do to the Crick?"

Hardwon pursed his lips, that wasn't the issue. "What is it doing to you?"

It very much was doing something to her as she looked down at her drink again and felt the warmly poison work its way through her like a familiar tune, felt in her bones.

The bartender had kept silent, arranging bottles and glasses politely keeping busy, away from the pair of them.

"You do this thing, Moonshine-" Hardwon continued.

She scrunched her eyebrows and tightened her mouth. "I do many things."

Hardwon gave a exasperated sigh, rolling his eyes before pushing forward, "I know, and you do many things well, but, well-" Words were hard and he was a fool, but like all things he went in headfirst. "You take on so many of people's problems, you bear the brunt of the world and people come to you because you're this figure to them. You will save them, yeah, but at what cost to you?"

A silence, a pause. Moonshine gave Hardwon that to let him know she heard his words, looking down in the drink.

"It's just… what I do, Hardwon." She tipped her head up at him. "I don't know what to say about that."

Hardwon rubbed his hand down his face, feeling his beard. "I'm not saying not to help people, Moonshine. Just don't do it alone. Especially if that person you're helping is yourself."

She furrowed her brow. "I don't need no helping about this. Not tonight."

"Then tomorrow." Hardwon answered. "Or any time, after this. I'll be there. All of us: Paw Paw, Balnor, Bev, the entire Crick itself."

Moonshine ran her hand along the bridge of her nose, trying to tunnel deep, a flair of aggravation coming over her at the mention of the Crick by him. What did he _really_ know?

"It's more than that, Hardwon. For my entire life I have told everyone I was of the Crick. I have spent every single moment of me being alive being the best I can be because if I was people's first impressions of the Crick Elves that would mean the world to us." There was a despair in her eyes, bags beneath them, that spoke to a compromise that went beyond physical. It felt of insanity. "I owe it to my people to be better than that. I owe it to them to be a Crick at the fullest."

Time was no object there, it was only answer and repose, in-betweens.

"You have been nothing but amazing Moonshine. I'm proud of you just by being with you all the time. You should know that."

It felt like a lie to her.

"I don't even know who I am!" She snapped, just the slightest, turning to him "How can you possibly trust that? Trust me?" Perhaps it was different amongst the elves, Hardwon thought. Perhaps there was more to race then what he had known from his very unique perspective. At the end of the day however, he wasn't dealing with an amorphous identity of Elven kind. He was dealing with his friend.

"Where I'm sitting, the Moonshine I'm looking at hasn't changed. As far as the world's concerned, she's still very much of the Crick. Brave and kind and hospitable all the same. Despite everything."

She growled, frustrated. He really wasn't getting it, seeing it her way; he was still trying to help and she didn't think he was using the effort well. "A false idol, perhaps. Just, leave it at that. **Please.** "

The haze of alcohol, of fumes, it came over them without either realizing. They weren't concentrated on it after all.

The bartender had twitched her nose up to the golden stage when the lonely sound of strings was heard: to an orchestra set up, and then, surprisingly, a goblin, neatly dressed, standing before a speaking stone mounted on a stand. It was then that the two boobs had been readily cognitive of the larger gems that surrounded, above them, like a system of sound ready to transmit throughout.

What had been a once more audible crowd of patrons had hushed as the lighting of the dance hall warmed, and yet darkened into a gold: like light being filtered through water.

Hardwon turned back to the bar tender, going to ask what was happening. All he had to do was observe however: She had bowed out himself from her job, going over to a compatriot over, gingerly taking his hand as they ducked out of the bar and to the dance floor like everyone else. Citizens of the Fey in every stripe and color had been there, as if they knew the plan, the organization like it had been natural.

"Hey, Moonshine-" he turned back over to ask what she wanted to do, but she had decided already, turning away, going away.

Piano. Light made into musical notes, it sounded like to Hardwon. They sounded like steps on crystal, raindrops from heaven. How precious they sounded as they spun into a quiet melody that was soon supported by a rise of strings. All of it was leading to the sound of music as the goblin closed his eyes and opened his mouth.

* * *

_"The wounds on your hands never seem to heal_

_I thought all I needed was to believe"_

* * *

Hands had clamped into hands, palms on bodies softly as people found their partners and the cycle began as Moonshine tried to make her leave. Hardwon could only follow in her flight as the room had started turning and the slight mistake of standing up while nursing drinks had been made prevalent.

The room had started spinning, and it was only partly because of the headrush and the intoxication. It was mostly because of its occupants actually did spin.

* * *

_Here am I, a lifetime away from you_

_The blood of Christ, or the beat of my heart_

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes_

* * *

A waltz. Much like those of parties Gemma used to frequent as a princess. Hardwon as a younger man could only look from afar as she was swallowed by civility beyond him.

He followed through what felt like a painting in motion.

* * *

_Senseless years thunder by_

_Millions are willing to give their lives for you_

_Does nothing live on?_

* * *

It was the maze she hoped to lose Hardwon in. She hoped he had gotten the message that she needed to be alone, and, if anything, she had paid for his drink to that ends.

She felt him however, the spores and shrooms on her back feeling his presence, his chase. She pushed through the dance floor itself and the dancers beginning their steps, finding avenues to flow through.

* * *

_Learning to cope with feelings aroused in me_

_My hands in the soil, buried inside of myself_

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes in you once again_

* * *

It was a sea he had never known: of people, twirling around each other, holding each other amidst a storm of a dance that spoke of formality and tenderness. The strings of the house orchestra played on in its heart aching swell. Only he and her had been alone as she waded through people, on her way to leave.

* * *

_I'll go walking in circles_

_While doubting the very ground beneath me_

_Trying to show unquestioning faith in everything_

* * *

He had to contort his body awkwardly, moving sideways and around, just to make it through the waltzing patrons, ebbing and flowing to the sound of the orchestra and the words of its singer.

* * *

_Here am I, a lifetime away from you_

_The blood of Christ, or a change of heart_

* * *

People who were happy, who were content with their lives paid no mind to the Crick Elf and the Human, totally left with themselves as they passed by as rain does on a window: Lost among people who knew, more than anything, who they were tonight as they held onto their partners.

The crystal ball above shone with holy aura, and Moonshine's red hair had never been more visible to Hardwon as he continued to move through the waltz trying to get to her.

She was out of character for a moment, bumping a little harder than she'd would've liked into some of the dancers, ruining their routine as she found the exit to the hall and peace in front of her, hopefully.

He gave chase, still, a haze of people unnoticing, uncaring, in their waltz as they so naturally moved around them all. It was as if they were both drowning in people, chasing dragons.

* * *

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes_

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes in you once again_

* * *

They both burst out into cold air, leaving their drinks behind, but leaving what concoction they did spin into their stomachs alive. Probably wasn't the best to be a constant producer of Crick fumes, but this was the first time in a long time the two had fought it. If anything, it was the first time they had fought each other.

"Leave me alone Hardwon!" Her raspy, husky voice had been raw. The street in front of the hall had been empty, thankfully.

Inebriation had made them float, randomly, down a street, Moonshine trying to find her way away, into an alley nearby. Hardwon followed. He had to.

"Moonshine!" He starts, and she's picking up the pace away. If she turns a corner out of that alley she'd be gone. He knows. He knows because he feels an absence in his mind he hadn't felt since he had met her. His rapport spores had been _cut._ "You just can't keep making these excuses, you just can't keep finding ways to put yourself like this! You can't hold yourself to this standard."

She snaps around with a crazed look in her eye, fire and water both in it. "Do you know what happens if I don't? Especially now? Go back to the rest of them, Hardwon, forget any of this happened. I'll be fine. I swear I-. **Hells, maybe you'll be better off without me**." It's the last thing she says that makes him cold. Makes him cold in a way he had never felt before. Makes him cold in a way that compels him to throw himself into a fire to feel.

"I'm not going to let you save the world, not like this. It's not right." Hardwon strains his voice.

"What does it matter who saves the world?!" She stops. Progress, one of her hands rolled into a fist.

The world was saved once, before their time. Three heroes. The Hermit. Strength. Judgement.

He hoped to all his Gods and all his Queens that they saved the world, but he hoped that he, and all those he saved the world with, would leave it better off than when they started.

"Because living up to an impossible standard is the reason why our world is the way it is now."

It lands, it hits. No amount of wisdom can save her from what Hardwon said.

"It has to be me then. The right type of me. The Crick Elf Me."

Hardwon balls himself up in his chest, standing straight. "Then you're no better than the Chosen. Because you obviously think of yourself as chosen."

Tough love. She glares at him. Glares like iron through flesh, like brushfires through the Crick.

"You're so strong you know." It's not a compliment, it's mocking. "It must be so easy for you to stand there and tell me that I can simply just be someone I'm not. You've had your whole life to work that out."

Hardwon is hurt. He really is. It stings at him in his lungs like water, filling it up. "Moonshine I don't-"

Both her fists curl. "From day one- day one!" She holds up a finger indicating. "I was told everything I was supposed to be. I was groomed to be who I am today and, more than that, I knew it had to be done! I was okay with it, even if it's not what I perhaps wanted at first. Can you imagine what it's like for that rug to be pulled out from under you? Please just answer me that. Tell me I am the person that should be trusted with the world."

"I- I can't." He doesn't pretend to know that of what she goes through. He can't. He shouldn't.

There is wist in her voice, that maybe that he did understand, that he did have an answer. Though he doesn't, and she drops her fists. "Then just leave me alone."

What he does say however keeps her for a moment more.

"Everything I love turns to death." Hardwon repeats his words to her, words he spoke during the fight. "Everything in me tells me that is what happens but… I'm still here. I'm still with you. With Bev and Balnor. I'm still trying to save the world. I'm **still trying**. I can't stop trying, even if what happens in the end isn't… the best. You're part of my world, Moonshine, so please just let me help."

"And you're part of mine, Hardwon, but I can't let you get caught up in what I do, especially if it brings harm to you." She gathers herself up, trying to find resolve but it falters and it comes out like alphabet soup: mushy and messy and all at once. "Paw Paw, the closest thing to my child! I nearly killed him because of me! I can't be _responsible_ for any of that. I just _can't._ Even if there wasn't this-!" She spread her arms out, full span, "I will live to see you die, Hardwon! I will outlive all of you! You think I want to go through that?! I will have to leave you at some point, and I can't be who you think I am forever."

She made to move, to go, to disappear, her curly red hair like fire as it flung itself back, but all it gave Hardwon was a target: vocally that is.

**"Moonshine Cybin!"**

She turned again. Her full name, said accusingly. She had never heard Hardwon like she had now as. It was if it was echoing through the chambers of Irondeep.

"I know who you are! And you do too!" Only in battle did he get this loud, bearing his teeth, seeing the fire in his eyes: "Daughter of Jolene Cybin! Next MeeMaw of the Crick! Mother of PawPaw Gump! Queen of Fungus and- and!" With all the throat and all the words that imbued him as a dwarf at heart, he bellowed from the mountain inside of him: " **My friend!** "

"Hardwon." Even she was shocked with how much bellow, how much air and throat he had thrown into it. She felt the walls around her shake, the glass panes vibrate as Hardwon, in his momentary rage, fire, settled, face emptying, blank, before finding focus on her.

"You're Moonshine Cybin, is all I'm trying to say. That should be enough. Whatever that is."

He took a careful step toward her, unfurling hands he didn't know he had clenched into fists.

"It should be enough that you care, that you worry about who you are for the sake of people around you. It should be enough that you want to live up to the ideals you had, and that the world is better for it. It should be enough, because you have given up enough."

He was within sporing distance of her now, his tiny steps approaching her.

"This world deserves the best me I can be, and I don't think I can do that, Hardwon. Not with what I know now." She said it so small, so backed down, it broke something inside of Hardwon to hear it.

"The world deserves nothing. You deserve what's best for you, as your friend, that's what I think. Please, if I mean anything to you, believe me."

The wind fills in the silence, a gust through the alley. Moonshine's lips dry and chap, she taking one lick of them as she looks at Hardwon, as scared and worried as her. "Friends?" She echoes the word that stays on her mind, long after she takes in what he said.

"Friends." He repeats.

Moonshine looks up at the stars, now returned to the Autumn Court and wonders if they know she's looking up at them. " _We're not just friends, and you know it._ " They felt a different kind of heat rise to their cheeks as Moonshine spoke it softly, just loud enough to bridge the distance. It was different from the alcohol, the moment; it was the heat of feeling.

Illuminated by starlight and by distant fireworks, alone in that alley, Moonshine offered her hand as the muted sound of music continued beyond.

Frostwind, all over, in a way. Dancing to music too pretty, too classy for people like them.

Though it felt right.

Was Hardwon right?

Moonshine parts some of her red bangs behind her ear, disheveled amongst it all, clearing her vision as he looks at a Hardwon trying to recollect himself.

Gingerly, she reaches a hand out, palm upward. "Entertain me, would you?"

"Anytime." Hardwon smiled, taking a step toward her and her outstretched hand, gingerly feeling her palm work into the center of his. Slightly, their fingers intertwined as the other found their shoulder. "Uh, you know what you're doing?"

She gave a cheeky smile. "Nope."

Having waded through a crowd of dancers they did their best impression.

It was enough.

* * *

_I'll go walking in circles_

_While doubting the very ground beneath me_

_Trying to show unquestioning faith in everything_

* * *

They started slow, going in a circle, trying to find the distant rhythm of that continuing orchestra. "We're being… a bit much, aren't we, tonight?" Moonshine finally admits.

"Mm." Hardwon growls out, more focused on making sure his feet don't betray them. It's a contrast from his confidence, of what he had just told her. Though it's because of she knows.

"I believe you. What you're saying. I want you to know that." She too is trying to make sure they both don't fall, but the waltz they do, its amateur, its exactly them and what they need. "It's just so hard to think."

"Ain't supposed to be easy, you know. Ah shit!"

Hardwon stumbles a bit, breaking their grip, but Moonshine is strong enough to keep him still as they reset.

"Focus, focus. Focus on me."

"Uh, right back at ya."

Giggling between the both of them, they do, finding each other's faces as they let their bodies waltz the best they can.

It's a little ridiculous, they realize, that all they know how to do is spin around each other, orbiting like the sun and the moon, but it's a comforting rhythm, one they gladly try to spice up. Moonshine holds his hip tighter as she swings herself a little more, and Hardwon moves faster to compensate, the world goes a blur as it all just builds like a snowball. Moonshine spinning, forcing them to spin faster and faster as finally, she hops on the tips of his shoes and holds herself back. Hardwon realizes what she's doing as he simply goes limp as well, and they use each other to spin.

Ring-a-round-the-rosie, almost, pivoting up and down the alley way with abandon.

* * *

_Here am I, a lifetime away from you_

_The blood of Christ, or a change of heart_

* * *

And they spun, and spun, and laughed and laughed until their feet had found a stone wall and they found themselves upon it, Moonshine riding up in her joy and Hardwon holding her back to it, realizing the ridiculousness of it, the funniness and pure simplicity of what it was to dance, and what it was to hold someone close.

"Maybe in another life, you would've been an elf, hm? You would've seen all of me through?" She had spoke to him, heart to heart in the moment.

He grinned, looking at her and all she was. "If I were only be so lucky to be one of you."

* * *

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes_

_My love wears forbidden colours_

_My life believes in you once again_

* * *

The music faded out, but not their reality, their situation, each other. So close, so warm, any separation felt wrong at that moment as, slowly, slowly, meeting halfway, the two pressed their foreheads together. The veil of alcohol, it comes and it hides over them. Social lubricant that it is over young hearts as they are, it feels nice, and they don't notice it. They only notice the courage, the emotion that was always beneath, bubble up and be brought to light as a certain haze floats over them.

"This is nice." She whispered in her breath, Hardwon feeling the warmth of it on his own mouth, his eyes closed and she, half-lidded, settling into this moment, content. It smells like Crick water and flowers. Moonshine smells the spice and falls in love with it.

"Yeah, it is."

It was nice to be held, to hug, to be wrapped up entirely with someone.

The coat which Hardwon had worn had buttons, easily unclasped by Moonshine as, uneasily, but then understandingly, she had undone them and let it separate, revealing a white undershirt. Slipping her hands almost into the coat, she chose to hug Hardwon like this, as close as she could to him and him alone. It was what felt best as Hardwon returned the favor and ducked his head down, burying his face in the side of her neck, taking in the earthen scent he had known deep in his soul all his life.

It was a weakness for both of them, then and there. For a moment so emotional, so full of heart, so full of utter dear regard for one another, they were both up front people.

What did you do with people you love?

What did you see in them?

Held in his strong arms, Moonshine grazes the impression of his skin with her fingertips. He's very handsome, very much a man of his time. He cleaned up well, she admitted, but she wasn't about cleanliness as her eyes drifted upon the glow of his skin, the form of his body pressed against hers.

How much woman did Hardwon hold in his arms now? To any passerby, they would've said a lot. And Moonshine was a lot. A lot which he would gladly hold like this forever as he looked down on her and saw the faint impressions of her freckles and her full lips, her teeth biting down on her lower one as her eyes were full of consideration.

Considering that Hardwon also felt, still, in the moment, feeling Moonshine's form against his own and facing a question. A question of tension, of palpable curiosity and mutual attraction.

Thoughts that they both pushed asides, not wanting to demean the other into those more base terms.

But didn't they think about it?

They did; before this, before they came to the Feywild. The first nights after they met, in the days and the hours of first impressioning. Then they paused, thinking of decency and mutual distance and not wanting to make it awkward. Though the pre-text of that, it was artificial, arbitrary.

 _I love them like family_.

They thought those definitions of each other wondering if that was truly what they believed.

Though love is amorphous, and little needed to be said, little ever needed to be worked out that there was love there and they both knew it over time. They were both supremely comfortable with each other in a way that evades all but only the most natural of relationships.

That was the emotional stuff: barriers put up by two people who guarded them well at times.

Though that was dutifully ignorant of another thing:

If Moonshine was a dwarf, Hardwon often thought, she would've been the most beautiful of them.

If Hardwon had been a Crick Elf, Moonshine mused, he would've been the communique of the creek; the hot topic, so to speak. A hot _stud._

Hardwon isn't blind to her. At camp often, he glances, just by his damnable inclination of being a red-blooded male, at Moonshine when he hopes she doesn't notice. He notices the way her ass fills out her overalls as she squats to play with Paw Paw, or the way her breasts sway so pertly despite their size as she shimmies between gathering or cutting ingredients to throw into their meals. More than once, or maybe that's just how she is, Moonshine indulges him in good jest that must be more casual at the Crick than how he understands it: In their one big beds, she often sleeps next to him when she does sleep, he being their outlying member on the side with Balnor on the opposite. They both often wake up first, finding their breaths in sync as they open their eyes to each other in the groggy morning hours where Bev still sleeps like the teen he is and Balnor soaks in every moment of rest he can. She rolls over, nudges herself, a little more into his heat, his chest, wrapping a hand over him for the briefest of moments as if sapping the warmth of the man, and she knows it. His own hand gently comes around and tucks her in closer, in recognition. He feels the softness of her cowhide undershirt she often wears to bed in his side, he feels the softness of Moonshine as she often, after a brief moment, crawls so she is briefly chest to chest with him, her arms propping her up in tandem with her breasts. More than once in his lucid, post-sleep moments, Hardwon looks down her shirt and, in the moments after, reprimands himself for even doing so.

 _"Hey there, partner."_ She often whispers in some form, half-lidded, taking in some feminine pride from the glances Hardwon takes in that he desperately tries to hide. " _Mornin'."_

 _"Morning."_ He responds back, and, with their faces so close, they beat back natural urges that come. Most days, in the five minutes or so they give to acclimate to the waking world, she rests her head against his hard chest and hears his heartbeat threaten to lull her back to sleep.

Moonshine too isn't blind to what a form Hardwon imposes.

She feels it in the way her thighs graze his morning glory every once and a while and she makes a mental note to not compare to memories of past partners so as to not embarrass them. She remembers his impression between her cheeks once when they did sleep, spooning (he sleeps on his back now, still embarrassed over the fact and many apologies later).

Due to their lifestyle, male Crick Elves are often fit, muscular even, but in the sinewy way, run raw by the needs of outdoor living. Hardwon is a different type of fit and muscular however in a way that is exotic to her.

He's big, his arms and muscles meant for shouldering a weight far beyond that of most mortal men. He doesn't shower often, in fact, he's new to the concept entirely, which is why he often comes back to the camp nearly bare after his bathing. In the glistening of the fire, Moonshine, while Hardwon often attends to his beard, drying it out first before his own body, she tracks the droplets of water across his body as they slide down and off across rolling mountains of definition. In Hardwon's more distracted moments like this, she traces the droplets further down, deeper, until they go to his place, soaked up by a loin cloth.

It is such a gender-normative thing to consider Hardwon attractive in his pure strength and muscle, but she would be lying to herself if she said that she doesn't feel something when he effortlessly moves something nearly five times her own body weight just because it inconvenienced him.

She'd be lying if she didn't feel something, right now, being held.

There are other things the two think of each other that go below that mature rating, far beyond their male or female gazes. There are more of them.

Moonshine is utterly captivated by his beard, at times, and, during downtime, in traveling even, makes Crick knots in it. It curves along with his mouth sometimes, reminding her of a puppy's face. The wide, bright smile he gives her, his handsome laugh lines stretching to show off his new beardly braids, melts her heart with a satisfaction that eludes her vocabulary to describe.

When he does that, naturally, Hardwon makes Moonshine smile, and the gap between her two front teeth is among the cutest sights he had ever seen, and he makes it a point to give her as much excuse to smile because of it.

He wants that look on her face now.

" _I don't deserve you."_ Despair, echoed even now, echoed like the witch in her head, told to Hardwon as he pulls back from her neck and takes in her face, worried. Action: Taken from the comfort of familiarity, of something they both knew was of intimacy and need and pure and utter belief in the heart. Like gravity, the Human and the Elf had come into each other, as water droplets do when meeting. Hardwon had stepped one of his magnificent legs forward, between Moonshine's own legs as she had almost leaned into it. If she had instead held her arms around his neck, she could've put a little pull on it: to sit on his leg and whatever that felt like. The height difference between them was no more, no less conquered by the distance between their hearts as foreheads collided in such a wantonly needed presence of touch. Free of the armor he usually wore Moonshine had felt more of Hardwon than she had usually when they did this in spur of the moment outbursts. She had felt his heartbeat through her own chest, and, impressively enough given Moonshine's well-recognized physique, Hardwon had felt hers as well through the softness. Their noses had bumped, colluded as they, upon the contact, nuzzled each other knowingly as the relief of a moment of chuckle, of humor, was murmured between them. Eyes closed, all they did was feel each other at that moment, the warmth felt on each other's mouths and cheeks, on their face from gentle, and yet aroused breaths.

They knew, from there, there was another step forward. One they had crossed before, either in pragmatic application, or to affirm who they were (to each other at steps, or for them).

Kissing Moonshine Cybin was a lot like kissing a dream: soft and surreal, a taste unable to be recalled even moments afterwards. Not freely given, nor unseen too, they were both death and life, the last feelings of mercy until death sometimes. And like dreams, when they ended, they ended with a pull to reality and all of its fierceness that it entailed. That was the force she put into her kisses as if a signature.

Kissing Hardwon Surefoot was like commitment however. It was not about what it felt like when it happened, it was why, and who. He was like the rock of his home, strong and sturdy and monolithic, but to break it down, to mold and form it, was to believe and to love the man. Kissing Hardwon Surefoot was a promise of walls broken down, and, if not that, at least someone coming in to share and not hurt him because he cherished you so much to allow it.

The two knew this. They had recollected these facts on their own as the world, somehow, shrunk further still into their senses in that alley alone, both actually, but now to each other.

It would be so easy to, like the forehead touching, like the feel of Moonshine's fingers along his strong arms at that moment, to move that extra inch and to feel physical intimacy at one of its highest points and to feel loved as nature, if its design was merciful, intended.

However, it didn't come easy.

The improprieties of arcane liquor, of the brief moment of respite where they were alone and able to exist with each other; to deal with everything that had brought them there and what it had done to them.

No Thiala. No War. No duty or responsibility to a higher power for the sake of all the world.

Nothing but two people wanting answers that would complete them.

Questions we all want, need, answered: Where do I come from? Where am I going? Who am I? How long have I got?

Another question then:

"Tell me what you want, Moonie. What will make you okay?"

That gravelly voice was given more of its sultry tone, spoken so quietly. His eyes were half-lidded, looking for Moonshine's own as she closed them and fought back silent tears. Trying to answer she had only breathed faster, harder through her nose on the verge of a breakdown. This vulnerability, this breaking, was like almost losing Moonshine again.

In truth, Hardwon, and dare he had said, the world, knew that Moonshine had no right to be like this. She needed no safety save for her own confidence, her own ability. He was not worthy to be that safety he had felt. He was glad that he was there for her(and she was, at that moment, glad as well), but this wasn't right. This wasn't Moonshine as he had known her and all the fiery strength of someone who would, if they won that war, would be someone who would lead Bahumia.

" _Hardwon._ " She mewled from the _hic_ s of a forced spoken word. It was all she could give as the tears streaked from her eyes and the broken breaths came up her throat. She said it still with all the familiarity of lifetimes, for, in the long span of things, how little a time she had known him.

The way she had always said his name, Hardwon had craved it deeply, not that he would ever admit it. The slick of her accent, of how utterly friendly and _hospitable_ she had used it… It had made the years of hearing it said in scorn at Irondeep so much worth it at times.

" _Please_ , Moonshine."

There are times when people need nothing but their own drive to arise and to save themselves. Sometimes it is in each other, destroying obstacles and enemies once impossible. Though these anecdotal stories fall away sometimes.

Sometimes people just need to feel, to do, to deal. It was simple as that.

Subtlety was never Hardwon's forte, but answers were not always straight forward. With questions as big as the ones that defined adventures, destinies, people, it had been made more corporeal than anyone had ever seen with the brightest eyes from the most beautiful woman he had ever known. He searched desperately for an answer to give her.

Question and answer. Strike and riposte. Call and response. The necessity of each other held by the touch of warmth that was only so much more felt after Moonshine had felt the coldest cold known by life itself.

Moonshine, more than anything, needed fire that night and she had tasted the spiced rum from her Fighter's breath.

She didn't remember when Hardwon's rough hands had moved to cup the curve of her hips, though she was glad for it as she let go of his forearms and only threw her arms up, her own hands holding the side of his face, gripping skin and beard, and raised herself up just enough to press her lips onto his and to kiss him as only she could. Not as a method of spore delivery, or a transactional affair, but simply to kiss in its simplest terms.

The kiss in the fight with Ezra, it was cold. That Hardwon remembered as he desperately made his case, begging almost in his way, that Moonshine was worth it to herself. It was the first kiss he had initiated with her, and definitely not for pleasure or his own intentions, but it was a kiss he had done all the same because he had, after all this time with the Band of Boobs, had known what language Moonshine spoke: in physicality and hospitality.

This kiss was the opposite: full of fire and fury and need and want. She had sucked the breath out of his lungs when she had parted his mouth, his teeth even, with her tongue and he had, as was true to him, fought back with his own.

_Nnnah._

_Uhn-_

They were both loud people. They didn't surprise each other when they moaned into each other's mouths with their present inhibitions.

No spores. No magic. No tricks or reason other than-

Moonshine pulled away from the kiss, leaving Hardwon, for a brief moment, chasing after her lips with a trace of saliva between them shimmering in dark night, broken like the silence as they locked eyes.

"Sh-shit." Hardwon stuttered, only to be stunned.

An image, a memory almost, of Moonshine at her most hospitable with a beautiful smile given, and meant, only to the man that held her now. **"I love you, Hardwon Surefoot."**

He had been thrown off mine carts, blunted with pick axes, fought bullywugs and devils and traveled a good part of Bahumia in pain. He had known that any day, perhaps over lunch, or even at random while traveling, Moonshine would've said that. She would've told him alone or with company, friends or strangers alike. She would've told the same to Young Bev, to her darling child Paw Paw, to Balnor, to those that would save them and those that needed to be saved.

Though this one he felt, as a hand had moved from her hip to the side of her head to cradle, his thumbs passing over a coral ear ring, hit different. Hit hard. Hit deeper than the coldest veins of Irondeep that he was charged to mine out. Hit deeper than his axe through Galad's neck.

Moonshine didn't need to kiss Hardwon Surefoot that night. She didn't need him to be okay herself (or at least better than she was right now). She was strong and an avatar of light and all that was good in the world and worthy of her role. She was hospitality and the very idea of _Home_ itself and held it within her to be good, to be alright.

She looked downward from the kiss, enough so for her freckled forehead to rest upon Hardwon's lips, and he had obliged, planting soft, chaste pecks upon head by reaction alone.

What she did need, was to let this man, broken as he was (and didn't deserve), know this in her haze of utter desire:

"I don't know what that means from me. I don't know who I am! Those words, they're, they're-" Moonshine pulled back, held only by a hand on her hip and her back against the stonewall. "They must be a lie. Just like me. You need to know that, Hardwon. I can't let you be a part of that. You're too good for it."

Words slurred, thoughts incomplete. The tragedy of the drink was nothing but truth let loose, no matter incoherent. Moonshine wants to be thrown by him, into the trash, left to rot like all sins are meant, left behind.

He doesn't. He moves back though and for a second Moonshine prepares to close her eyes and open them, never seeing Hardwon again. He doesn't however. Like the rock of his homeland he stays put, moving his hands to her shoulders and holding her still before again, softly, placing his forehead against hers as she breaths and shudders.

"Do you really believe that?" he whispers to her, and only her.

She responds only in a drunken whimper, moving her head up and down, grinding her forehead for a moment as she remains and wants to only feel that connection.

"Do you really believe you are nothing more than just a lie?"

"I don't see anything else. Not now. My whole life was just built on something I thought was the only thing I thought I could be." She whispered so fragile.

"You lived up to it though. That goodness you believed you were." Hardwon had said it like a child, meeting their hero, and in a way he had been. "I've been half-elf ever since I met you, Moonshine."

He was proud to think of himself as one. Human-Dwarf, Dwarf-Human? Culture versus nurture and nature. So, what if he was now also part elf? He wanted to be if it meant being closer to her in the end.

She beamed at him as he said those words, that momentary pride, realization, that maybe, just maybe, this good man was how he was because of her, it filled her with a knowing comfort. Hardwon saw it in her eyes.

"I don't believe in much nowadays. Gods are fighting. I've sent my own Mother to the Hells. I've loved and…" Hardwon is distant for a second. He's holding another woman, almost exactly like the way he's holding Moonshine now, he's kissing her, he's young and in love again and everything is right in the world and then- It's gone, it's over, she's dead. Moonshine feels the tinge in her fungal network. She's so attuned to Hardwon that she can feel his chemistry in ways even she can't understand. She feels him grow cold himself and she reaches up again, tracing his strong jaw through a beard she has grown to nuzzle into on one of their one big beds. He relaxes, feeling her touch, continuing. "Lost. Yeah. I've loved and lost and have been to blame. I don't believe in much, a lot of this world is based on lies, but…" he latches onto Moonshine with a look that stops her stroking, and she is captured by eyes she wants to impart onto her memory forever. " **You are my truth, Moonshine Cybin.** So, believe in yourself, whoever you are. If not for yourself, then the people who depend on you."

Common was a hard language, to read and to write. The two of them would know best. First however, Moonshine Cybin had this series of thought: _Those words were perfect. When did you bequeath yourself of using such right words, at GOOD times Hardwon Surefoot. This isn't fair. Who's writing your lines? Is it one of them bards who spend their god given gifts to instead write sappy romantic fiction at wee hours of the night for mere bronze coins at seedy general stores if not on open fiction boards such as Ayoethree and Eff Eff's Net? Also I love you_ _ **so much right now**_ _it's stupid._

Hardwon was also, a second after those words came out of his mouth, also surprised at how particularly smooth it had been.

He would've joked about it. He would've made a back pedaling comment, as he did, to divorce himself from such an uncharacteristically earnest and sappy statement.

He would've said something but Moonshine's mouth was in the way.

Thrown upon him with her body, she aimed, with advantage, and landed when she needed to. Maw Maw would always recount of a younger Moonshine, one which sprawled and often got betwixt the trees of the Crik and stuck among them, too afraid to jump down because of the heights she traveled. That same dexterity served her well to jump into Hardwon, and his strength served him well to catch and settle into the kiss again, one arm wrapped around her back to hold her, the other raising his hand to cup her face.

This kiss was halfway between a reward and a natural reaction; like a laugh after a joke, or a breath out of water. It started that way anyway, lovely and kind and rejoiceful and sweet, ending only when a breath was needed between them.

Foreheads touched again in the interim.

"I love you, Moonshine Cybin."

Another kiss, soft as rain, sweet as sugar, imprinting the feel of it to both of their memories forever.

A queasy goblin stumbles, trying to find a place to let go of his guts from a bar he stumbled away from elsewhere. He looks down the alleyway and sees a man and a woman so enthralled with each other even he in his drunken stupor figure it best to go somewhere else and let go. People deserved their moments, he thought as he feels his concocted drink somehow bring fire into his mouth and he remembers he ordered the Dragonborn Dram (for an attack you are granted a Dragonborn's breath weapon and roll accordingly).

If the goblin would've stayed, he would've seen Moonshine lower herself from Hardwon's arms, but not remove herself completely. A hand of hers had wandered down his backside, only to find a home in the warm pocket over his left glute.

"Hm?" He asked from his throat. She answered with a squeeze "Uwah-"

She seized his mouth again in his surprised utterance and she wanted more.

The taste of the Crick, the taste of fiery alcohol, it was shared between them as they kissed deeper. It was a kiss that would've engrossed lesser people, but the two had been anything but lesser. That's why Hardwon had been very aware of the hand that had been feeling up his ass and lower thigh through his slacks, running her fingertips in meticulous circles into his flesh. He was always one to rise to meet a challenge.

The hand that had been at her cheek moved down slowly as the two disconnected for a moment of breath, foreheads resting against each other again. It had traced her neck softly by the pad of his fingers, Moonshine shifting her head back, only to lean into the warmth for a moment as she looked at him with warm, if not inquisitive eyes as her wandering hand froze at the small of his back. It froze because she had been more concentrated on the wanderings of Hardwon's hand as it moved off her neck, drifting along the side of her torso so tantalizingly near her heart (and what had been near that).

He soaked it in, that feeling of heat and rhythm: the pump of her heart, ever slowly raising up in pulse. He wanted to perhaps feel it closer, feel it deeper. He had tilted his head one way, an eyebrow raised, mouth taut into a thin line, scared to ask outright.

She had chuckled, realizing what many men had often been too squeamish to outright ask. "Not like I've got some spikes like a porcupine, sugar, feel for yourself." She had perhaps underestimated when she had shook herself, shifted, and let Hardwon's hand slip from her side and slide into her overalls just enough to entertain the possibility that was presented to him. It was feeling those rough, big hands on one of her breasts, just laying upon it at first, and then the pressure of a light squeeze, it had made her squeak as the hand at the small of his back grabbed tighter.

"Oh _yes._ " Those words had come out of her mouth involuntarily, and she almost went to apologize had it not been for Hardwon returning the favor of moments ago and seizing her mouth again. Her hand had continued its ministrations, feeling the muscles of his back through his shirt, driven to action by the pawing at her breast by a man building up confidence and want.

Another, thicker strand of spit was left between them as they parted again by Moonshine's intention, putting her mouth somewhere else.

"You wonderful, wonderful man." She panted, in between sucks and kisses placed along the side of his neck. " I wish this world wasn't the way it was. I wish that you and Gemma were still in Irondeep and still together and still in love and I wish that they treated you as you deserved. I wish this world was better for you." Pressing her face into him, breathing him in, she was half frantic, half desperate as was entirely their fault for it.

"You don't mean that for a second... 'Means I would've never met you." Hardwon growled for a moment, coaxing Moonshine back out before she had been taken by her sides and hoisted up, almost until she was eye to eye with him, her back against the wall and-

"I only want what's best for- ! Hnngg-!"

Both of his hands had left her for a moment, his body pinning her against the wall as instead they had found themselves palming at her chest through her overalls, mimicking the circles she made in her back as he buried her moan in another kiss. Utterly groping Moonshine had been a natural progression, the metal buttons of her overalls barely competing with her hardening peaks as he continued to feel her, and she continued to be felt. For a woman who hadn't worn much clothes, her overalls had become second skin, and even then and there, with a man handling her and just shy of her straps falling off her shoulders, it didn't feel like anything.

She reveled in it: the heat, the letting go, how easy and how good it felt to be felt up and to be held and to be seen as Moonshine Cybin.

To be Moonshine Cybin was to also give. To give her love, to give herself, to give happiness and hospitality as befit any situation. Whether it be jambalaya or kind words.

It would've been so easy, so coy to make the obvious comment given his name, though she kept silent as she let one of her hands place onto his chest flatly, only to shift its way down to over his trousers, finding, and then holding onto his obvious reaction to all of this as pointedly as he had been paying attention to her breasts, running her hand up and down, up and down over the surface of its shape. It was tented by pants that had made no effort to hide its heat or tautness. Like molding clay, it turned into rock soon enough.

" _Oh sweetheart,"_ She moaned, letting go of his lips of a moment as she continued her hand's movements, and he had only squeezed her in turn once, losing focus. He didn't moan, he breathed; panted. "Let Mama Moonshine take care of you."

One of his hands had slid under her overalls outright, finding a nipple, tweaking it as she squealed. "Like Hells you are-" The pressure of Hardwon increased as he pushed her up against the wall even further, squaring their hips together as she drew her hand out from its touch, her legs wrapped around his midsection as heat met heat, more humid than any Crick summer day. For all the saliva traded however, their mouths went dry when, experimentally, Hardwon had rocked forward.

" _Hoy shit-!"_

_"Haah-!"_

By instinct Moonshine rocked back. Like dominos falling, reaction upon reaction, the rhythm established friction and feeling, the last step held back by cloth and social decency. Seconds felt like hours, the only sense of time was the moments their lungs burned for when their lips hadn't been locked.

"You feel so good, Moonshine." Hardwon panted into her neck.

"Even- hua- Even just like this?" She made a point to curve her hips and rock them in a way that gave her control, feeling the hardness of him line up just right through her overalls, letting her feel so, so much, and yet not enough.

Hardwon had tried to deadpan, but it was difficult given the circumstances. "It's kinda hot."

"Damn it better be!" Her hands raised to grab his cheeks accusingly, only for them to laugh as she pouted, remembering who they were. "Getting all touchy feely on my tits as we dry hump like some misbehaving kid in the bag." She was going to go on but Hardwon thrust again, an utterly embarrassing groan out of her throat spilling out as he had continued his rhythm. In truth she didn't think she was going to get much action for a while. This was better than anything she expected for as dry (technically she definitely wasn't) this had been.

It was a comfortable, if not amateur display of mutual friction and want. Hips meeting, lips smacking, a pattern of affection and physical intimacy that stayed like a pot of water at boil.

"If you- you- push a little faster, honey, you'll do me an awful fine favor."

Hardwon had been buried in her neck, soaking in the earthen smell with her sweat, fungal bits in his beard from it. "Yeah, like what?" He breathed.

"Oh, ah, you know."

Of course, Hardwon Surefoot knew, he told himself. This wasn't sex, but it definitely wasn't not sex. Though that meant something. Whatever he was doing, he was doing it with Moonshine.

"Is this, alright?" A sense of fear was in that question. So many questions and fears.

Wonder, question, had been in Hardwon's brown eyes. It brough Moonshine to earth a bit, more than she would admit. Cupping his cheeks, she had seen his worry.

"We're both a bit under the influence, aren't we?"

He nodded urgently, realizing the implication. "I-… I still meant what I said, Moonie. Don't you doubt that. I'll say it anytime, any way, any place."

This time a tender kiss, full and warm and slow had been Moonshine's answer before she broke off. "I know, 'hon. And don't you mince my words too. I love you real special like."

"What do you want to do with it then, eh?" Hardwon raised a bushy eyebrow.

"What we've always done, why not? Not like we'd change much." They'd just be who they were, together, on that journey. It was only right, so naturally right. "Whatever we are, whatever **this** is, we can put a pin in it for later, yeah?"

"Of course, sure." He said softly. "But what about you? Are you okay? Will you be okay?"

Maybe, maybe not. Maybe it was good she had been going through what she had. If it were easy, then her being a Crick Elf wouldn't have mattered anyway.

Grounding herself to him again, foreheads touching, she could do nothing by sigh dreamily. "Let me figure out who I am, get past all this world ending stuff, and then, yeah, maybe."

"I told you," he started. "If you'll have me, I'll be at the Crick anyway… or whatever new Crick you find. It's home."

She had knocked her forehead softly against his again to make a point. "Home is people, ya big idiot."

He ground his forehead back. "Then it's wherever you end up of course, then."

The heat returned when she had wiggled her hips, moving against Hardwon's groin.

"Well, tell you what, I'll let you take me someplace good now, honey."

She feels him in such a way, cradling him at his core and feeling that heat, that electricity. It's like static, and all she wants right now is a charge as she rocks forward and, by instinct, Hardwon melds his hips forward in response. One of his hands slides down the side of her face, down to her neck, hooking the loop of her overalls and dragging it down, a flap of her clothes fluttering down exposing one breast out that the same hand had eagerly groped it again.

So many points of contact, so many points of pleasure as she feels her nipple get tweaked by rough fingers. She wanted to yell out, to moan, to cry in that ecstasy, but her hot breath was seized by Hardwon's mouth again, their tongues fighting in a way only they both could respond to each other.

For a moment, both of them, breaking from a very wet kiss, still finding a certain, breathless high by their ministrations at their grinding, their frottage, looked down at how natural this felt. How good this felt. The unmistakable mound of Hardwon laying into Moonshine's crevice. Their eyes were both begging each other, for each other.

They thought, in the crassest terms, how good would've it felt like to just _fuck._

Maybe another day, another week, another year. Maybe when their adventures were finished and the domestic life was their reward.

Though then again, domestic people didn't do this in public.

"Harder, Hardwon. Please." She whispered into his ear and he had only hoisted her up, breaking their kissing. She would've complained but Hardwon's fuzzy face had found itself now in her cleavage. Warmth that night came in many ways. Hardwon had found the guiltiest version of it as he had allowed himself, face first, into two of Moonshine's more notable features. Far from her best though. Her best feature had been again and again: her hospitality. Her tits were pretty ace though, he admitted while in them.

This was him returning her the favor and then some as he had, in a blur of utter desire, latched his lips around her exposed nipple as he had done as she asked and pushed her. Harder and harder. Moonshine doesn't think too much of the philosophical, psychosexual implications on why the breast play and this particular act makes her feel so good. The alcohol made her feel everything his mouth did: his breath over her areola and his tongue lapping over the pebbled skin around her breast's peak. She moaned, groaned into his hair as her arms wrapped around it.

She was so close. So close in so many ways. She was so close to just knowing what it felt like again to be utterly fucked, to have a dick inside of her, if not for the thinnest veneers of decency and denim. She was so close to Hardwon as she felt the strike of pleasure wrack out from her chest, her heart, and heat her up so impossibly lustfully she started seeing the spots in her vision intermingle with the stars above. She was so close to just wanting nothing more than wish for a life where this is what she felt, every rutting moment of her life.

She was so close to just cumming that nothing else mattered as she had snaked a hand down through her overalls and parted her lips wider to just let the impression of Hardwon find deeper purchase. When he did, she pressed a finger upon her clitoris and rubbed, accompanying each thrust with stimulation in between frantically. Hardwon’s hands cup her ass, if only for stabilization, keeping her core at best angle for him to do what his body told him. She doesn’t mind the grip however (and quite frankly neither does he). The pressure he imprints onto her comes from two directions and it makes, in her best approximation, something inside of her be held down like a spring, like a squeeze.  
  
Crudely, she thinks as she's being just short of _fucked_ , her insides are missing something to squeeze herself, and just that thought sends the heat within her to a flash and all of her physical fantasies manifest as she moans.

It was like falling: the point of no return. She knew what was happening as Hardwon stopped the sucking of her breast and looked up, a desperate look on his face that read he had been holding back himself, as he gave her his all.

She lost the hearing of anything else in that world save for his labored breathing and the words she spit out, looking down on him, hazy looks in each other's eyes as their faces became their everything.

They desperately try to hold that moment.

Hardwon looks up and sees Moonshine's face, being herself, mouth half open as she has this most natural, pleased, happy, content, and almost _fucked silly_ look. She looks like she did, having saved her people from Crick Rot, in that Jambalaya after. She looks like Moonshine as nature intended. He would've, personally, preferred to keep the image of her face without the lustful incantation to it, but he knows there will be times ahead where he would make her like this without the sexual healing, without the carnal visitations. Still, in a moment of selfishness, he thinks to himself, if this is what she feels without even going in, he can't wait for the next time.

Moonshine looks down and sees a man who has been hurt, so physically, so emotionally, that it is a miracle that doing anything like _this, for her_ , is within his cards. She sees him in that determinate, almost in the heart of battle twist, his jaw strung tight, his heart on his sleeve as he fights with its power. All of it is put into making her feel good and, by the gods, she feels sublime and getting to the precipice of satisfaction that, for a moment, she hopes that everyone could feel one day.

Her moment of selfishness as she approaches her orgasm, as time slows in this moment in the run up, is that: Hardwon is her own. This is her goodness.

The moment ends however, like the sea rushing in, fireworks snapping again behind Moonshine's eyes as she knows it's time. The rough tempo of clothes against clothes, their in-sync, hot breaths unable to be hidden as they felt pleasure they had, for a while, forgotten. The realization that, in the end, their both two young people who had fallen in love with each other, eases them over like a comforting hand.

She slams her forehead against Hardwon and he only growls in response, pushing back as she places another kiss, wanting to get it in, but unsuccessfully holding as she pants into his mouth:

"Hardwon. _Hardwon. Oh, hah-! Please!"_

Her hand that's stimulating herself in her overalls is at the verge of cramping, but she fights through the burn as she draws away and lets Hardwon alone carry her across the line.

She's there. Faster than she could anticipate, with the way they were doing it. No penetration, nothing more than old fashioned bumping and grinding and touching and feeling and all she can do is bury herself in his neck and take it everything.

She came, and it went. A groan into hardened skin that turned into nips, kisses, intelligible sweet nothings as she closed her eyes and held onto the man's back for dear life. "Oh Melora. Oh sweet Melora."

The peace and grace of getting to those highest highs and feeling the definition of good, she felt the wide smile on her face as she closed her eyes and simply breathed in and out the smell of a man she called family. Beneath her fingers she felt the sweat he had perspired on his neck, his breath through his neck as she realized in her solace: he was shaking, panting, tremors.

When feeling returned she still felt him very much same as he was.

Hardwon was still hard.

"You-," she paused there a second, giggles coming from her throat. "You doing okay there Hardwon?"

He had giggled in return, nuzzling her face with his own affectionately. "Holding in there." He opened his eyes to look into her own blazing greens. "How're you?"

She answered again in a liplock, slow and measured, comforting and answering. "A bit like that."

Dumb smiles, happy moments, pure. Hardwon mewled. "Mm."

"How about you then, honey?" She didn't need to ask as she felt him basically vibrate, and he had panted, forcing out a laugh.

"Nothing I can't deal with." He said bashfully, non-committal. He had let her grip of her go enough for her to finally stand on her own, albeit she had felt the shake in her legs that made her glad Hardwon had remained holding her hips, her eyes drawn down at his tented pants.

She had slipped the hand from her core out, absolutely soaked. Like most things on her hand she had gone to wipe it off on her overalls, however she was a Crick Elf, she knew dirty. She felt dirty as she saw the absolutely glistening texture of her fingers and the very repulsion that Hardwon would deal with _that_ on his own. Oil to the fire, so to speak, as she kept her hand wet.

The Barbarian in her had, with the hand still on the back of his neck, forced them to change position. It was Hardwon against the wall now as she shrugged her overall's strap back onto her shoulders, the devil's fire in her eye as she pinned him, slightly offset, like so many morning moments in bed they shared.

Unlike those times however her covered hand, still warm, snaked up his shirt, feeling the navel and his happy trailed hair, following it down beneath the waistband of his pants.

"Oh, who am I not to return the _hospitality?_ "

She didn't look down; she only felt, eyes locked with Hardwon's as his gaze went vacant, and then full of life as she seized him and felt that maybe her own slickening might've not been needed.

He was firm, and hard, and about what she thought for a man of his stature. The tricks worked all the same however, just she had more to work with as her finger tips grazed head to base, bottom to top again. He groaned, head back to the stone.

That was only one move.

Maybe another night, a different time, Moonshine would've let him know how fertile she really was. Though tonight he had deserved some gratification as the piston-like movements of the tented pants, up and down, had barely hid what she was doing.

"Awh, fu- shit. Moonshine you don't have to-"

"Shush." She breathed into his ear, only to pepper kisses along his neck.

He really should've done more, but the ball of fire in his gut had been brewing too long, squashing the buzz of Crick water and tightening, tightening further up; coiling and coiling as Moonshine repeated continued her stroking.

His fingers moved on their own, one hand trying to find purchase on the wall behind him, the other, more contently, finding the small of Moonshine's back and grasping.

He'd never reached his finish before by someone else, so his mind fought him: it felt good and wrong at all the same moment, so so good, so unfamiliar and yet familiar with who was doing it.

The indecent wet noises that filled the air mingled only with the breath out of Hardwon's nose, quickening in pace. He was holding back, afraid of a barrier, like so many he had put up in his life. This was a jump he had never made it past himself with someone, and the unknown scared him.

She was there though. She always would be. She whispered encouragements, dirty and sweet, all with the single intention of this:

_"Let go, honey. Let go."_

Spores came out of her mouth, tickling his face, marking him, if just for tonight. A version of rapport spores, gentler, kinder: Feeling made fungal. Relaxing, soothing, helping.

Hardwon trusted her as Moonshine felt him let go of the breath, of the tension, wound up inside of him and instead let her in and feel the very core of what she was doing:

All the friction, all the slickness of her hand, her encouragement, the view he was given: still an ample view down her freckled cleavage, his own hand sliding down to cup her ass again in want, her gorgeous face looking up at him with all the affection in the world…

_"Huah-!"_

She watched him finish, looking at his face: tightening, strained, and then relaxed, moaning into her hair. She continued through it, drawing all of him out, his hips jackhammering in sputters as he had found the finish line and made the sprint for it.

"Go on, come on." His hips didn't stop, and she felt it as she continued, coating what she could not see.

Of all the ways of being pent up, as this night had so gladly shown, this had been catharsis.

When his breathing flattened, and his hips stopped moving, receding himself, only then did she even begin to consider the full breadth of her work. She did him the service of wiping her hand down on the insides of his pants before holding him again, palms at his chest and feeling his heart, his breath.

"How was that, 'hun?" She teased.

What had once been a face of complacency, the standard look of post-nut clarity, had went sharp and in distress at her as his eyes flew open.

" **These aren't my pants Moonshine!"**

* * *

**_Yep it was a spill, 100%, here's some gold to cover that, thanks have a nice night!_ **

Viralis had been less than convinced, but he'd never outright ask as he simply let Hardwon fold it and hand it to him. A simple cast of Mage Hand had handled it the rest of the way as Viralis, blank faced, simply bid the two goodnight after a concerned shut of the door and subsequent locking.

Embarrassment, but it wasn't anything they hadn't known before.

Leaving them, just them.

"So uh, that happened, yeah?" Hardwon rubbed his beard, looking away.

Giggling then followed to his surprise.

"Wish it didn't?" It's that tease in her voice that drains out any of the uncomfortable pricks within him.

He snapped back to her, nothing but a comforting smile illuminated by fire light, beaming up at him.

"Mmm I don't think so." He could only smile warmly back. "Still, this leaves us as… something?"

"Well, what were we before? Not like much has changed, I think."

He shrugs. "I'm okay with that."

The true answer was obvious however:

They were Moonshine Cybin and Hardwon Surefoot.

Moonshine's confidence, known and familiar, had returned in her voice as she took her lead, her hand on his arm again warmly. "How about this then? We do what we need to do, and, at the end of all this, when you're a Prince and I'm… whatever, we'll do…" she looked for words. "-each other? Feel it out, I mean, not like we're too complicated about... us. I think."

He chuckles. "I can do that."

She blows a raspberry at him, burying her forehead into its side.

"For now though, just this second," She takes his hand. Or rather, he holds hers, being so big and all. Though it's comforting, and she wish she could do it for so much longer, but that was for another time, another place in life. "We'll pretend to know what's coming."

So they walk back, hand in hand, through the court as if they had known how to all their life, pride in each step as they relished the still ongoing celebrations and the festival, painted above in the stars. They take their time, not too concerned about getting a full, long rest that night. Separately, they both knew they would sleep just well into the morning.

Returning back to the outskirts, to the hills and their one big blanket for the night beneath the stars, so many stars.

Paw Paw is stirred awake by the grass they step on, and, in his groggy state, barely notices that Moonshine and Hardwon had been gone at all as she rakes her fingers again behind his ears and through his fur, lulling him to sleep as Bev turns over, nursing his own sleep after partying. Balnor is still very much Balnor, mouth open and snoring, sleeping like a dad. Mercifully it is more rhythm than volume.

Paw Paw settles on Bev tonight actually, and it offers the two returners a moment of consideration, of guilty pleasure and a perfect way to end that night:

It is in her nature to want to be the big spoon, and Hardwon allows as they settle down onto their one big sheet on soft ground, however before they turn over, Moonshine's arm around his side and trying her best to cradle, they ground their foreheads together one last time and share a kiss.

One last kiss. One last moment to themselves before the day came and they proceeded on their journey for the future of Bahumia.

They kiss, silently, eyes closed, Moonshine feeling his chest beneath her fingertips, and Hardwon returning the favor, gracing her cheek with the back of his hands, rolling his knuckles softly across her face as they parted.

Affirmation.

_I love you._

They mouthed those words like a prayer, and it gave them their peace and solace.


End file.
